Stamps Faculty Projects Selected for ARIA & C-lab Research Opportunities

Three Stamps faculty members are recipients of the first grants from the Arts Research: Incubation & Acceleration (ARIA) grant program, and two Stamps faculty were selected as fellows in the Creativity Lab (C‑lab) research development program. Both initiatives were created by the Office of the Vice President of Research and the Arts Initiative to support innovative projects that center the arts in research and creative practice.

ARIA Recipients

The ARIA projects were selected through a competitive, multi-step peer-review process. Three Stamps’ faculty arts-centered research projects have been funded through ARIA from a competitive field of 29 submissions. Submissions were received from six schools across the Ann Arbor campus and programs on the Dearborn and Flint campuses.

Too Much and Never Enough: Feminist Animations

Principal investigator: Heidi Kumao, professor of art and design, Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design.

Goal: This project examines the political climate around women’s bodies using a series of experimental stop-motion animations and fabric works.

Variations of Sound

Principal investigator: Pedram Baldari, assistant professor of art and design, Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design.

Goal: This project presents a platform to facilitate a metamorphosis of violence into hopeful possibilities, using objects such as decommissioned weapons acquired from police to produce performances, sound installations, videos, and music albums.

Tethered

Principal investigator: Anne Mondro, associate professor of art and design, Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design.

Goal: This project will create a series of intricately woven wire sculptures that reflect on the complex and often conflicting emotions associated with being a caregiver and care recipient simultaneously.

C‑lab Fellows

The C‑lab, a research development program designed to stimulate new work in arts research, recently selected seven faculty members as fellows. The one-week summer laboratory program will also contribute to building arts research cohorts among a wide variety of faculty. 

Upon completing the five-day lab, each team member will receive $1,500 in discretionary funds to advance their research project toward new constructions, exhibits and performances, and future grant applications.

What was Promised? Speculative History of Landownership in the late 1800s of Formerly Enslaved Black Americans Following Special Field Orders No. 15

Principal investigator: Quinn Hunter, assistant professor of art and design, Stamps School.

Invoking Coyolxauhqui: An Animated Source of Creativity for a Broken World

Principal investigator: William Calvo-Quiros, associate professor of American culture, LSA, and associate professor of art and design, Stamps School.